Michael Tomasky

It’s not as if we needed one more example to prove that the mainstream media have developed a reflex of accepting the premises of the right in order to make liberals look discredited. But try this one on for size. This past Sunday, Howard Dean was a guest on Meet the Press. Host Tim Russert […]

From the looks of things, this was supposed to be the beginning of the Summer of Love, Bush White House-style. The president actually sets foot in France; he shakes the hands of surrender-monkeys Jacques Chirac and Gerhard Schröder, and even tells the former that he should stop by the next time he’s in the neighborhood. […]

When reading news stories about the Democratic presidential hopefuls, and about the Democratic condition generally, I often find myself conducting the Rove test. This is our era’s political version of the Rorschach test and consists of one question: What does the information herein look like to the president’s guru and amanuensis? That is to say, […]

I swore in something I wrote elsewhere last week that I wasn’t going to get angry about George W. Bush’s jumpsuit caper, and I’m not. My gut is still telling me that most middle-American swing voters saw the stunt for what it was, and that not a few soccer moms came away vaguely put off […]

George W. Bush hopped aboard Air Force One and flew out to New Mexico, Nebraska and kindred pressure-point states to hawk his new tax cuts just days after the administration announced that another plane, this one flying from Baghdad back to the states, would ferry home Task Force 75, the military unit in charge of […]

I was in Ames, Iowa, in the summer of 1999 for the Republican straw poll. The event is best remembered at this point for the lavish nature of Steve Forbes’ hospitality tent, which redefined supply-side economics. Generous portions of lobster were supplied, and while I didn’t make it near the teeming feeding troughs, I did […]

Pop quiz: If the Democrats are going to stand a chance of beating George W. Bush in 2004, they are going to have to put tremendous effort and creativity into winning over which of the following groups of voters: a) gay men and lesbians or b) people (gay, straight, whatever) who currently think that the […]

The argument now picking up a good head of steam among commentators on the right — and sure to last for as long as seems useful to them — is that we on the left, broadly defined, have disgraced ourselves by essentially cheering for our own country to lose the war. Our hatred for George […]